Main navigation

Avatar Influence Game

Submitted by Kaisa
on 26. April 2018 - 8:52

Avatar Influence Game is a game format by Tellervo and Oliver Kalleinen to experiment with new ways of local influencing.

Via an open call, the artists invited three peer groups from Maunula, each with an issue they hope to advocate in the neighbourhood. To advance their agenda, each team received an avatar helper played by a professional actor. The collaboration with the avatar kicked off at a workshop where also the tactics of the intervention were developed.

The process culminated in three game events over a week in early June. From the 'game centre' established at Maunula House, the teams conducted the avatars to make interventions in public spaces. Equipped with mobile cameras and headphones, the avatars received instructions from the team who followed the actions in real time on screens at the game centre. Audiences could participate in the interventions at the game centre as well as on local streets and parks.

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Oliver Kalleinen

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

Jaime Culebro

The groups and their agendas:

Maunula saves the world wanted to influence the carbon footprint of the neighbourhood.

Team Safety Shoe addressed the feeling of safety, both in terms of traffic and socially.

The Clean Maunula group's main target was to fight litter on the streets, especiallly dog poo.

The aim of the artists was to create a fun, collective format to influence developments in the neighbourhood – while discussing the ethics of online and offline worlds. To the participating teams and actors, the experiment also made visible many other issues such as the power and means of influencing and the limits of privacy in public space.